1. Field of the Invention
This invention generally relates to carrying cases and storage systems, and, more specifically, to a flat article carrying case or portfolio and storage system utilizing the same.
2. Description of the Prior Art
Certain large flat articles, such as engineering drawings, prints, drawings and paintings prepared by artists, large photographs, large advertising layouts and the like, have generally not been simple to transport and/or store. Unless these articles were rolled up and placed inside cardboard or metallic tubes, any carrying case designed to carry such flat articles or materials were necessarily much thinner than they were wide or deep. As a result, portfolios and the like used for carrying such materials tended to be flexible. While such flexibility has not presented a serious problem in terms of transporting the articles, excessive bending of the carrying case could impart creases to the materials being carried and possibly damage the same, particularly if the articles being carried are not themselves flexible, such as mat board, canvases and the like.
Currently known portfolios are simply larger versions of smaller briefcases. However, exhibiting large sized flat articles or removing same from a case for display is typically inconvenient or difficult. Since the only way to view or to show the article carried in such a case is by removing the article from the case such large flat articles are sometimes difficult to handle and removal or repeated handling can result in damage. Most existing portfolios do not permit the display or partial display of a flat article, such as a drawing, without removing the drawing from the portfolio.
For the same reasons that large flat articles, of the type aforementioned, are difficult to transport and display, they are equally difficult to store. Generally, the portfolios used for carrying the articles are not used for storing them. Accordingly, such articles, as unwieldy as they may be to handle, must typically be removed from the portfolios and placed in an appropriate storage device, such as a large cabinet of drawers, each of the drawers of which must be sufficiently large to accept or receive the articles in a flat condition. Such cabinets, typically made of wood or metal, can be extremely costly. Of course, whenever the flat article needs to be transported it must be removed from the drawer into which it has been stored and transferred to the portfolio. Such movement of large articles between the storage system and the portfolio used for carrying the same, and vice versa, is generally inconvenient and time consuming, and may result in damage to the flat articles.
Flat portfolios or cases for storing and transporting flat stock materials, such as drawings or paintings, have been used for a long time by artists and draftsmen. U.S. Pat. No. 931,853 is one example of a flat case that can be used for this purpose.
Many flat cases frequently used by artists include handles to allow these cases to be carried about. Examples of such flat cases are disclosed in U.S. Pat. Nos. 1,175,070 to Maxwell, 4,061,224 to Fuhri and 4,852,725 to Folsom.
The portable easel device disclosed in U.S. Pat. No. 4,372,630 includes a carrying case with support legs for supporting the easel in the ground. A form of storage system or structure for detachably receiving at least one retaining board is disclosed in U.S. Pat. No. 4,793,508 to Thompson. Here the entire case or storage system is itself portable. When such case or stage system is on the ground, individual panels may be selectively removed, as best shown in FIG. 3A.
Also known, also no patents are herein cited, are relatively wide file cabinets which have relatively thin drawers for storing flat drawings, such as engineering drawings. Such drawers, however, are normally not intended to be removed since they are very heavy and not really portable.